Changes
by Reetinkerbell
Summary: "Living a life day after day." Major spoilers through Series Four - 'Journey's End'. DoctorxRose.


**Title:** Changes  
**Series**: The Slow Path  
**Author**: Reetinkerbell

**Fandom**: Doctor Who (New)  
**Spoilers**: Through "_Journey's End_"  
**Characters**: Rose Tyler, The Doctor.  
**Summary**: "Living a life day after day."

**Rating**: PG  
**Word** **Count**: 2 955  
**Written**: July 2008  
I don't own. Please don't archive without permission.

**Changes (1/1)**

– – – – –

Rose stares at the cartons of tea in front of her. All around, harried housewives with children in tow hustles around the shop, clearly stressed. She feels a bit guilty for being childless and clearly not in a hurry to be anywhere else as she steps closer to the shelves to allow a mother and her two children pass. The mother sends her a look of thanks before her screaming infant distracts her.

"Rose!" she suddenly hears and she turns her head to watch the Not-Quite-Her-Doctor as he strides down the aisle, clutching three jars of jam in his hands.

Rose nearly groans. She really hopes Donna has been able to bash some sense into him when it comes to not putting your fingers into food you share with others. Somehow, she doubts it.

"I've never tried blueberry-apple before Rose, why didn't you tell me they had blueberry-apple here? And pineapple-mango-raspberry. That's a bit of an odd combination isn't it? But I'm sure it's good Rose, because why else would they sell them? If no one liked them they wouldn't keep making them so people must be buying them right Rose, isn't that right?"

She stares at him, wondering if maybe she hadn't kept him in her house just a tad too long. "Yes. That's right," she finally settles on to say.

He doesn't hear her, dumping his cargo in her basket before turning his focus on the tea. His eyes lit up as he caught sight of a blue and green box. "This isn't supposed to be mixed up till the 25th century at the earliest. Rose, this is fantastic."

"Shhh," she hushes him.

He carelessly drops the box into her basket on top of the bananas he'd placed in it almost immediately upon entering the shop. She'd rolled her eyes with a fond little smile on her lips when she'd seen him coming towards her with his hands full of bananas and though she'd teased him about his obsession with the yellow fruit, she'd been secretly pleased.

"What's this? This is new." The Doctor looks at the box closer and before Rose has a chance to stop him, he licks the side.

Rose's eyes widen as she swats his arm. "Doctor! You can't go around licking the packets," she hisses at him, throwing a glance at the old lady down further in the aisle. Rose really hopes she didn't see anything – old ladies seemed to never be able to stop themselves from commenting.

He frowns at her. "But Rose, how else will I know if it's good? Almost everything is a little bit different here, including how they make food. And, my taste buds are slightly different now, because I'm slightly human."

Rose stares at him before sighing. "What else did you lick?" she asks, knowing there had to be _something_.

The Doctor grins sheepishly as he leads her towards the jams. He stands next to her as she looks at the rows upon rows of different jars. In this universe, jam had almost completely taken over – it was the leading sandwich topping in the world and as such, there was a jam of practically every flavour.

She looks up at him. "So which ones?"

He rubs the back of his neck, suddenly nervous. He motions with the other hand at the shelves in a vague sort of gesture.

Rose groans loudly. "We should've gotten a cart."

– – –

He's sitting at the kitchen table, frowning at a small stack of papers when she comes home. He doesn't even look up at her entrance and barely hums in reply as she greets him.

"What's this then?" she asks as she puts away the food she picked up on her way home.

"I'm trying to decide on a name."

Rose pauses with a bag of frozen green beans in one hand and a carton of vanilla ice cream in the other. "You are?" she hopes he can't pick up on how thrown she is. He's been living with her – living _with_ her – for nearly four months now and up until she left that morning he'd still steadfastly refused to pick a proper human sounding name for himself.

He nods in reply, still frowning down at the papers in front of him. The black wire frame glasses he now actually needs for his weaker human eyes slide down a bit on his nose and he pushes them back up frustratingly.

Rose puts away the last of the food before she comes closer, looking over his shoulder. It's the papers Pete provided her with shortly upon the Doctor's arrival – to help him set up an identity. Rose smiles behind him at seeing them; having been half convinced the Doctor had thrown them out already.

"What's giving you trouble?" As she looks closer, Rose can see that he's filled mostly everything out, including the first name of his parents. She smiles sadly and places a hand on his shoulder in a comforting gesture when she sees the name _Donna_. Somewhat surprisingly, he'd listed his father's name as Jack.

"I can't decide on what my name should be."

Rose sits down next to him at the table, frowning slightly. "I guess I just assumed you'd go with John Smith."

"I thought so too, but it doesn't feel right." He looks up at her, his eyes searching her face as if the answer can found there. "And no one ever believes me when I say that's my name. And can you imagine going through years and years known only as John Smith?" He shook his head. "No, I need something… else. John, I can live with, but not Smith. Or maybe I'll keep the Smith and change the John? I know some Smiths after all. But then, I feel more like a John than I do a Smith. But I could be a Smith, probably easier than I could be a John. Can you imagine me, as a John something-rather? No, I'm more of a Mr. Smith, aren't I? But then, John is an old standby. I've used it for many a years. Actually, I've used it for as many years as I've used Smith, so I can't really use that argument, can I?"

Rose is nothing if not helpful when it comes to her Doctor and before he continues with his indecisiveness, she interrupts him. "I can see where you're having troubles."

"So I thought I'd just either use both or neither, but as much as I don't feel like a John Smith I don't want to come up with two new names, because I only have a short amount of years to live now Rose, and I can't waste all this time thinking about what I should be called."

Rose wants to smile, but luckily manages to fight it. "How about we flip a coin?"

The Doctor gapes at her. "You want to flip a coin over one of the most important decisions I'm ever going to make in my life?" Rose raises an eyebrow and his shoulders slump in defeat. "Oh all right. Heads I keep John, tails I keep Smith."

"You got a coin?"

After a few brief moments of coin hunting, Rose returns to the table. "All systems go," she says and tosses the coin in the air. She catches it a moment later and slaps it down on the back of her hand. "Heads it is."

The newly named John writes down his first name on the proper lines with a flourish, a smile on his face. "Now all I have to do is pick a last name."

Rose sighs. "I'll just get started on dinner while you think about that, shall I?"

John nods solemnly. "I think that would be best."

– – –

"I'm just so _bored_," John complains as he helps Rose pull down the covers of their bed. "I'm mostly caught up in the differences here from back home and once I am done, I'll have nothing to do. I've even started to read slower just so I won't run out on things to catch up on too quickly."

"You need a job," Rose replies, her back towards him as she sets the alarm. "Why don't you talk to Pete? You know we'd be happy to have you at Torchwood."

He sits down at the edge of the bed, taking off his watch with practised ease. "But it's Torchwood Rose. I don't exactly have happy memories."

"It's not like we're the same Torchwood from back home you know. Besides, if it weren't for this Torchwood, I'd never have been able to find my way back to you, now would I?"

She's slipping in under the covers beside him and John follows suit, turning off the night stand lamp once he's settled against his pillow. "You're all very cleaver, yes. But I can't go around with a gun Rose; it's just not in me."

She smiles against his naked shoulder, her hand resting against the sole heart beating inside his chest. He's never felt as warm and loved as he does in these moments, just laying still with her in the cocoon of their bed.

"Love, Pete said you didn't have to do field work. No guns necessary for a desk."

He sighs, knowing it's inevitable he'll end up at Torchwood. But he's going to resist for as long as he can – because though she's right next to him and he can feel her right next to him, the word Torchwood is still associated with losing her and the aching loneliness he felt. The aching loneliness the other him must feel still.

"Or maybe you could write?" Rose suggests, perking up a bit as she shares her new idea. "All the things you've seen and done. I'm sure a lot of people would be interested in reading about it."

"Rose, I can't tell people all of that. I could change the-"

"Universe forever, yes, yes, I know. Honestly," though he can't see her, he knows she's rolling her eyes at him, "I mean in more of a science fiction novel sort of way. All those adventures that-"

John splutters. "_Science fiction novels_? Rose are you mad?"

"I'm only trying to help here," Rose argues.

"Well, _honestly_." He's quiet for a moment. "And can you really see me writing anything? I'd drive all the editors mad."

Rose smiles against him. "You do have a tendency to ramble a lot."

They're quiet after that and soon, Rose falls asleep.

When she wakes again, the bed is empty. The room is still dark and she glances behind her at the glowing red numbers of her alarm clock. It's near four am. John needed about as much sleep as she did and unlike her, he wasn't used to staying up while tired. In the beginning, she would often come home to find him having dosed off on the sofa. Once he adjusted to his body's need for rest, his naps were less frequent.

The bathroom door was open, the room behind it dark and empty. Rose frowns, sitting up. The house was quiet, but that didn't mean anything. On one quiet night such as this one, she'd gone up for some tea and found him dismembering her kitchen appliances with a screwdriver.

She rises from the bed, suddenly worried. If he can't sleep, it can't be good. Barely pausing to pull on a robe, Rose slips out of the room and walks quietly down the dark hallway. There's an odd clicking sound coming from behind an almost completely closed door. Frowning, she pushes at it. It swings open to reveal the Doctor, dressed for bed complete with a bare chest and naked feet, sitting in front of their computer.

He pauses and frowns as he reads what he just wrote. Rose leans against the doorjamb, a smile on her face.

"What are you doing?" she asks him after a while, stifling a laugh as he jumps around, startled.

He looks guilty as he hurriedly clicks on the save icon and closes the window. "Uh, nothing," he replies.

Rose smiles at his antics. "You've been writing about some of your adventures, haven't you?"

"Noo," John lies. Badly.

Rose crosses her arms while giving him The Look.

He sighs in defeat. "Sort of, yeah."

"All right then." Rose comes forward and kisses the top of his ruffled head. "Have fun."

She turns and walks back down the hallway to their bedroom, the smile never leaving her face.

– – –

He's almost late to their wedding. It's a very small affair, only her parents and brother in attendance, but though it's only really formal to make what he's been considering true since they were left together on Bad Wolf Bay official, Rose had insisted on following traditions. That included a rather idiotic human custom of not seeing each other the night before the wedding.

While Rose was staying the night in her old bedroom at Pete's house, John spent the night alone in their home. He walked the hallways, looked into the empty rooms neither had thought to do something about yet. He thought about his future – with Rose. About the mortgage they pay off on every month, the carpets under his feet and their impending marriage. He thought about children and desperately hoped they'd have their mothers smile but not her jeopardy-friendliness.

He stays up too late and barely hears the alarm ringing in the morning. He's half an hour behind schedule when he turns over in bed, sleepily reaching out for Rose before he suddenly remembers and he shoots up like a jack-rabbit.

He glances at the clock as he hurries to the bathroom to shave, nearly nicks himself several times as he tries to use the razor and locate his white Converse at the same time. He finally finds the left shoe under their bed and when he washes the excess foam off his face, his skin is smooth and nearly prickle free. There's no blood, so he doesn't linger.

The car stalls and he wishes he had a mallet to hit the dashboard with before he notices the time. He pulls out his cell phone and calls a taxi, nearly groaning in despair as they get stuck in traffic.

Three blocks away from the church, he's had enough. Stopping the driver, John hands him some money before he steps out and runs the rest of the way.

– – –

Rose smiles as John comes through the door. He's happily surprised to find her home already, being of the belief she was going shopping with Jackie for most of the day.

They sit down for dinner and it's quiet and peaceful. John talks about his day of going through the rather large storage facility Torchwood uses for alien artefacts they've found. She laughs as he describes the looks on their co-workers faces as he dispels their hard worked theories with nothing but a raised eyebrow and a hint of a smirk.

When he asks her of her day, Rose is evasive and waves it away. John, though he loves hearing Rose talk, is silently glad, as he's well aware of how the shopping trips with Jackie normally go. After all, he's been subjected to many of them.

Rose smiles as she hands him his desert – banana split, hold everything but the banana and a bit of ice cream. She smiles as they clean a bit of dishes together, their dishwasher broken again. She smiles as they watch the last bit of the news and she smiles as she brushes her teeth.

John starts to worry when Rose can't even seem to stop smiling as he kisses her. They're in bed and though John quite likes it when Rose is happy with him in bed, the smiling was beginning to creep him out.

"What's wrong?" he asks, voice grave.

Rose laughs at the look on his face, giving him a sunny smile. "Aside from the fact that you just stopped kissing me, nothing's wrong," she says and leans up to capture his lips with hers again.

But he evades her attempts. "Then why are you so," he waves a hand over her form hidden underneath the cover, "happy looking?" he finishes, rather lamely.

"I look happy because I am happy." Rose runs a hand through his hair, caressing the side of his face gently. The fingers stop at his lips, moving teasingly back and forth over them. "And here I thought you were the genius in our little family."

"What are you so happy about?"

"I'm happy about a lot of things," Rose answers. She removes her fingers from his lips and John is just about to complain when she tangles them with his instead. It's awkward lying in bed facing each other and holding hands at the same time, but they make it work. Their joined hands rest against her stomach and Rose smiles.

It's his right hand she's holding – the one she often tells him still gives her the creeps. He knows that this hand creeps her out so much more than the one he used to have did – because this him grew out of the hand she's holding. He's so consumed with memories that it takes him a moment to realise Rose is staring at him.

Expectantly.

"What?" he asks, once he's had enough of the staring.

She rolls her eyes at him, the smile not dimming in the slightest. "I didn't go shopping with mum today," she informs him.

"Oh?"

"I went to the doctor's office."

There's the expectant look on her face again. The smile, the slightly raised eyebrow. The squeezing of the hand that's resting on her stomach.

John blinks.

"_Oh_," he breathes.

And then he smiles.

"Fantastic."

**The End.**


End file.
